What did Bill Simmons say about Kendrick Perkins to set off ESPN analyst?
pic.twitter.com/G3ZSQlQKQr
A new sports media beef is brewing between former NBA player and ESPN analyst Kendrick Perkins and The Ringer founder and veteran sports media personality Bill Simmons.
Perkins has responded to Simmons' blistering criticisms of ESPN's NBA Draft coverage, promising to further address Simmons directly on Sunday via his Road Trippin' YouTube channel.
Simmons described his decision between the different ESPN NBA Draft broadcasts — one of which featured Perkins — as a choice between "[taking a] samurai sword and [jamming] it into my temple" or "[taking a] chainsaw and [sawing] my leg off?.
Simmons then went in on Perkins' suggestion that the Toronto Raptors could be one of the six-best teams in the Eastern Conference in the 2025-26 season.
'[The Raptors] took Collin Murray-Boyles, and Perk said they have the pieces [to be] a top-six team in the East," Simmons said. "And at that point I started looking for a third ESPN channel, but there were only two covering the draft."
Obviously, Perkins took great offense to that, questioning Simmons' place as "the head honcho of overseeing basketball."
Ill address your ass @BillSimmons on Sunday my Guy pic.twitter.com/PatmWMhIL6
Simmons recently feuded with former ESPN analyst Pablo Torre over the latter's Bill Belichick-Jordon Hudson reporting, and now Perkins is trying to spat with the former Grantland editor. The irony is that Simmons has been in Perkins' seat as a draft analyst in the past. So some of Perkins' comments don't really land.
Two things can be true. First, ESPN's NBA coverage throughout the playoffs and the draft featured way, way too much Stephen A. Smith and way, way too much focus on the panelists over the game. Perkins is part of that uninspired coverage, and Simmons joined a lot of people disappointed in how ESPN covered these huge events.
On the other hand, Perkins suggesting that the Raptors might be one of the better teams in the Eastern Conference next season might be one of the most milquetoast NBA takes uttered on ESPN this summer.
If you're looking for specific examples for why Perkins and ESPN at large don't do a good job of covering the NBA, this is not one of them. As exhaustive as Perkins can be in his NBA analysis, this take could age perfectly fine. Who's to say the Raptors won't be a top-six team in the East next year with so many stars already out for the year in that conference? We have no idea either way.
Sports media feuds always carry an air of silliness when you consider how trivial they are and how much else is going on in the world that deserves real outcry.
These are two well-compensated people who have both had their fair share of atrocious takes over the years; we all have bad takes, most of them are meant to age poorly. Simmons being that snarky about ESPN discounts his own gaps in his NBA (AND FILM) coverage, and Perkins' response to this will probably be a headache-inducing overreaction. The world will keep spinning, of course, Stephen A. will keep yelling into the empty void and they'll all keep getting massively overpaid for their work.
We're sure this will eventually taper out as most sports media feuds do, and we'll see who else Simmons and Perkins irritate in the months and years to come. Same as it ever was; same as it ever was.
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